


Secret Names

by HK44



Category: The Kane Chronicles - Rick Riordan
Genre: Coming Out, Ficlet, Fluff, Little bit of angst, sadie is a good sister, trans!carter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 07:10:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15383415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HK44/pseuds/HK44
Summary: Telling Sadie his secret name wasn't so bad as telling her his hidden name. His secret name gave her power over him, sure, but his hidden name, the one he whispered to himself at night, that one let her know who he was. What he was.And that he was a boy wasn't something he wanted her, or anyone, to know yet. Or at all.





	Secret Names

**Author's Note:**

> LYDIA GIVES ME ALL THE MOTIVATION FOR WRITING TKC SO THIS ONE'S DEDICATED TO HER.

“Hey.” Sadie pushed open the door. “Can we talk?”

Bes was in the lobby, ordering food and a personal shopper. In two days, the end of the world was happening. Sadie had just brought him back to life. His mouth still tasted like chocolate.

He’d just been poisoned and so close to death but he could remember a really nice looking man with very nice looking wings, telling him he didn’t work for the Egyptians but that he could be willing when he wanted.

And then her voice had cut in.

And he didn’t want to.

He didn’t want to tell her his name.

But the end of the world was coming and the winged man telling him it wasn’t his time just yet, don’t release yourself, and he just wanted to  _ let go _ . Give it all up for one. Just  _ tell _ .

Why did he tell?

Now Sadie was staring at him like he was some kind of travesty and she was holding back her feelings of horror.

Carter cut his eyes from her back to the window. “Sure. What’s up?”

Sadie fiddled with her fingertips. She was  _ never _ nervous. In all his years of knowing her, even the miserable middle when they were siblings that acted more like distant cousins and barely spoke, he knew she’d never been nervous. She could’ve streaked through a public park stark naked in broad daylight and not feel any shame, not be terrified about onlookers.

It was one of things he envied about her. She had nothing to be afraid of.

He did.

“Your name,” she said flatly after a spell.

“What about it?”

She stared at him then walked over and sat down. “How long?”

He shrugged.

“Carter.”

The name hit him like a train.

The way she said it, so easy like she’d been calling him that for years. It fit perfectly in her mouth, rolled right of the tongue like he’d always figured it would and felt so right in that moment, he was so happy he picked it.

And then the shame set in.

“That’s not-”

“Shut up.” She grabbed his hand and stared at his palm. “You should’ve told me before.”

_ Nothing _ terrified him more than that. If he had the choice between jumping straight into a river of flames or telling, he’d choose the flames. Every single time.

He’d tried to hold it back, had given her everything else first, spilled all his other secrets, his history, the things she knew and the things she didn’t, gave it all to her. And then it pulled out of him too. His secret name and his hidden name. The one he mentally corrected other people with, the one Horus called him, asking if it was a nickname, and he  _ knew _ it wasn’t but he knew Carter wasn’t going to spill the truth so he ran with it and honestly, for all that he was annoying, Carter couldn’t hate him for that.

But he’d never heard it aloud.

Until now.

“I’ve never told anyone,” he said quietly. “I don’t even know if I- If I’m-” His breath caught. Gods, what if he  _ wasn’t _ ? It dwelled on him every moment. Their dad had taken the liking girls thing so well and okay, fine, fine, Carter was a lesbian. But that word sounded so wrong but sometimes so right. And what if he wasn’t-

What if-

“Your mind is an anxiety pit,” Sadie said. “I know that now more than ever, Carter.” And there it was again, that pleasant sweet jump and he just wanted to cry because he  _ wasn’t _ supposed to feel like this.

“Sadie, don’t-”

“I will call what you  _ want _ me to call you,” she huffed out, all righteous instance with a tone of British snobbery. “And you  _ want _ me to call you Carter.”

He stared at her. “You don’t care?”

“No.” She squeezed his hand. “I don’t.” She nudged his shoulder with hers. “ _ Bro _ .”

He snorted.

Then dropped his head. 

“I don’t know how to be a-” He paused and took a breath. It was okay. It was okay, he could say it now. He could say it, just say it, Carter. He swallowed thickly around the word and all the while, Sadie watched him careful.

Then she pulled her legs up to her chest and said, “Remember when I asked if I was mixed?”

He exhaled shakily. Two years before the start of this Egyptian nightmare. Christmas. She’d been so quiet and withdrawn, he wasn’t used to it, and while their dad was out shopping with their grandpa, their grandma in the kitchen boiling potatoes, she’d blurted out the question.

After it fell out, so shocking in the moment because  _ of course _ she was, every bit of her fear came out with it. Like a single log being let go and releasing the whole river.

“Yeah,” he said. “And I said your mom is white, your dad is black, it doesn’t matter what you look like Sadie, it doesn’t matter what people think or say…” He stopped. Then exhaled sharply and squeezed her hand. “You’re mixed.”

“Same logic,” she said. She squeezed his hand back. “If you’ve been a boy since the start or only recently or for however long, you’re a boy. Doesn’t matter what you do. Or how you act. If you say you’re a boy, you’re a boy.”

The thought. So simple. His own words back to him and right there he could see himself doing, saying, “I’m a-”

He stopped.

Just.

One.

Word.

_ Say it _ , he thought.

Oh, but he’d never actually said it outloud. Carter, yeah, he’d whispered it under his breath, into his pillow, when he stared at himself in the mirror before a presentation or a networking event and just  _ imagined _ what if, instead of the usual, he just held out his hand and said, “Hi, I’m Carter Kane.”

This was different.

A name was a name. It could change whenever, be shortened down, jokingly lengthened, be misquoted, misinterpreted. Meant a thousand different things in any kind of language.

But a boy was a boy.

In any word, in any world.

And he was-

He-

“It’s okay,” Sadie whispered. She kissed his cheek and held in close. “Take your time.”

She could be so annoying sometimes. A little sister through and through. And that made him her brother. 

Her brother.

He pressed his cheek to the top of her head and sighed. “I’m your brother.”

His eyes fluttered shut. 

There it was.

All the weird achy anxiety locked up tight in his chest for years and he just murmured it into her hair like it was nothing. It was a secret but it was  _ theirs _ . And she would hold onto it for however long he asked her.

But in the air, the way it fell and all the knowledge that she  _ knew _ and she loved him anyway, he didn’t want to hold it back.

He pressed his face into her hair more and kept whispering it. “I’m your brother. I’m your brother. I’m your brother.

Sadie slung her arms around his neck and curled into him, and, oh, long time since that happened. He could remember them, vaguely yet clear, young and sleepless in the dark of night. Sadie would suddenly appear in his doorway before clambouring up on top of him, insisting that the monster under her bed wanted to eat her and Carter would just wrap her up and promise to protect her from all the bad in the world, including the salivating monster so determined to eat her toes. He’d keep her so close and tight he could feel her heartbeat begin to dwindle down and just feel happy he was protecting her from the bad things.

Like an older sibling was supposed.

Like a big brother was supposed to.

Because he was her brother.

Older, smarter, kind of cowardly, not as strong as he could’ve been but he was still working on that.

He wrapped her up close in his arms and felt her fingers run over his head, sliding down his back and just calming the rapid beat of his heart, caught between panic and happiness, not sure how to feel.

She could protect him too. In battle, in fights, in quiet moments like these when he was baring himself too open and didn’t  _ understand _ , was so terrified because he’d never said it before, because she was the first to  _ know _ , and she just pressed up against him, her breath shaky and holding back tears and her hands small, calloused and clingy.

In the dark of night, he was young and kept himself awake with rattling thoughts of danger and worry. He was too small to be afraid but always was. Just at the reality of the world around him and maybe because the small feeling in his stomach murmured that the dresses he wore weren’t meant for him and because the way his dad joked about being outnumbered wasn’t right and because he knew, he knew, he  _ knew _ and just didn’t  _ know _ .

And then she’d be there. Sudden and loud. She’d clambour up into his bed and demand protection from the monsters and he’d sigh and huff but hold her close anyway because for all she was annoying from time-to-time, loud and pushy and never careful, she had a stupidly wonderful way of quelling his thoughts silent.

He just didn’t know why.

“Did you know?” he whispered.

“No,” she said. She buried her face into his shoulder. “I didn’t know. I really didn’t. But-” She pulled back and blinked at him with wide wet eyes. “I know now. And you should’ve told me sooner. I am  _ very _ annoyed about this.”

He snorted and pushed back her hair, to kiss the top of her head. Such a familiar act and he’d done it so much when they were small and stupid and didn’t know a damn thing.

He needed to do it more.

Her eyes were pulled close and she relaxed as he pulled her back into a firm hug.

“Thank you,” he murmured. “For saving my life and for-” He stopped and started over. “For being okay with it.”

“You are my brother,” she said slowly. “You could kill a man and I’d probably help you bury the body.” She shook her head. “No, no,  _ definitely _ . I’d definitely help you because you would do it all wrong.” She sighed and pulled away. “You just don’t know how to do things without getting caught.”

“At least when I do things, I don’t blow up.”

She shot him a dirty look and rolled her eyes. “Whatever, Carter.”

He grinned at her and after a beat, his smile bled into hers, spreading quick and wicked across her face.

She was going to say it a lot. To erase the previous or to make it natural or to force it into the world, but she was going to say it a lot, over and over and over, until the name bled  _ true _ .

Because she was his sister. And he was her brother. And he was a boy.

As they heard Bes clamour back into the hotel room, he considered that. Carter Kane. Magician. Eye of Horus. Member of the Twenty-First Nome.

Boy.

He was a boy.

**Author's Note:**

> I need to write more TKC tbh. Trans!Carter is my life.
> 
> [Tumblr](HTTPS://happyk44.tumblr.com) || [Other Links](HTTPS://linktr.ee/hk44_art)


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